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023 “ “It’s A Stab In The Dark.”


Gavin and Mech had split up to cover more ground inside the dark warehouse.

Gavin hadn’t liked the idea very much and it wasn’t just because he suddenly felt a lot more vulnerable without the LT at his side. The warehouse was still entirely dark and he had not been able to locate a control panel. There was no voice activated computer interface either.

Holding his Seburo tightly in one hand and a tiny pocket torch in the other he slowly made his way down the corridors of the ominous building. So far it appeared to be entirely abandoned. Perhaps her intelligence is not as good as she thought.

He reached one of the larger storage halls. He could feel the immense size of the room but his flashlight did little to illuminate the surroundings.

Gavin froze when he thought he heard faint footsteps somewhere behind him. He whipped around to find nothing but more darkness.

He began to take a few steps backwards only to run right into a solid wall. He turned around again and the light of his torch fell right upon a very familiar face, no two inches from his own. The man wore wrap-around sunglasses, fused to his face.

“Holy crap!”

Gavin took two quick steps backwards and brought up his gun.

Black never even flinched.

In fact he appeared to be frozen in place behind a transparent screen. Gavin approached carefully and soon realized that the android’s entire body stood like petrified inside a duranium casing. And that was certainly not the strangest part of it all. Just to his left was another casing, like the first, it was about two meters tall and half a meter wide. Like the first it contained an exact copy of the android they had named Mister Black. And next to that one there was another. There was an entire row of casings all containing exactly the same model of android. Gavin looked up to see even more sitting on top of the first row. It’s an army.

He could spot at least four rows but there could have been more, he couldn’t be sure without more light.

The operative found a mechanism at the container’s side and the transparent screen opened to allow access to the body. It smelled not too different from the way his hover had when it had been brand new.

The mouth opened easily. He shone his light into the opening and then reached inside. He frowned when he felt a slimy substance inside.

How was your day, honey?’ he imagined his wife asking him later that night. Fantastic really. I had a chance to stumble around a pitch black warehouse and feel around into another man’s mouth. Ya know, routine stuff.

He could not find a data chip inside. When he withdrew his hand it was covered in white goo. He wiped it off on the androids coat. “Sorry ‘bout that. Hope you don’t mind.”

Then footsteps again.

The open transparent screen exploded just inches away.

His face was hit by a few shards, scratching his skin but he hardly even registered the pain. He blindly fired the Seburo into the direction he thought the burst had come from and quickly stepped back, trying to find some cover.

< LT, somebody is shooting at me, > he said his voice raspy and out of breath

< I heard it. Where are you? >

< West part of the building. One of the storage halls. >

Gavin kept firing one phaser blast after the other into the darkness until he found a corner he could slip into. He quickly made sure his six was clear before he spied around the corner again to find his attacker.

He was forced back almost immediately when the incoming fire resumed, smashing another screen and scorching the android’s body inside the chamber.

“Bastard,” he mumbled and checked his Seburo, he was still getting used to this gun. It had clearly not been designed to fire energy blasts and was a little more sluggish on the phaser setting than his old Fletcher. He couldn’t get himself to change to the more powerful projectile mode just yet.

A noise coming from above startled him and he aimed his gun into the air. He held his fire. It was Mech, she had somehow managed to take the high ground and had leaped onto the row of casings. He smirked, she was without doubt the most athletic person he had ever met.

Their opponent had apparently noticed Mech as well and had decided to hit the lights. The powerful illumination blinded Gavin for a moment. His surrounding had suddenly taken on brightly flaring colors.

The attacker opened fire again and the rookie knew that he was trying to shoot Mech. He came out from around the corner and for the first time could see the shooter.

He took aim. “Municipal Safety, drop your weapon!”

The man had no intention of doing so and instead dropped for cover and fired at Gavin.

The operative shot back but neither one was successful in landing a direct hit.

And then Mech came leaping off from the row of casings above. She spun around in mid-air, performing a flawless pirouette as if she was partaking in an Olympic competition, as she dived towards their attacker.

To his credit, the man noticed her approach but she was too fast for him to take proper aim. Before he knew it she had landed in a crouch directly behind him. He spun around but by the time he had, the cold barrel of her Glock was pushing against his forehead. He knew instantly that it did not have a stun setting.

He held his own phaser at his side somewhat unsteadily as if he couldn’t quite decide if he should bring it to bear or not.

In the end the decision was taken from him. Gavin had dashed across the room and quickly snatched it out of the man’s hand.

“Thanks for the assist,” the young operative said.

The man took two steps back and raised his hands. “Alright, easy now, you’ve got me.”

He was of medium height and had short brownish hair and angular facial features. Most noticeably was the prominent vertical ridge sitting on top of his nose.

“You’re Farian,” Gavin said.

The man nodded. “My name is Lutious Agon, I’m an agent with the Farian Security Consortium, a government contractor.”

“Yeah, right.”

“My ID is in my jacket.”

Gavin exchanged a quick glance with Mech who gave him the nod to proceed. His hand darted inside the man’s gray jacket to retrieve a slim wallet. Inside he discovered what he had been told.

“It looks genuine.”

Mech holstered her weapon. “What are doing here?”

“And more importantly, why are shooting at us, you nearly took out my eye,” said Gavin and wiped blood off his face. The cuts stung but they weren’t deep he was relieved to find. His wife wasn’t going to be happy though.

“I thought you worked for Grayson,” the agent said. “My mistake. Can I have that back now?” he added and gestured for his phaser.

“Grayson?” asked Gavin and ignored his request.

The man nodded. “Yeah, we’ve been investigating him for some time for his ties to the Orion Syndicate. We don’t have enough for a case yet but we’re close.”

“That would make sense. If he’s behind the stims market in the city he would have to have a supplier somewhere,” said Mech. “There is no bigger drug cartel in the galaxy than the Orion Syndicate.”

“Sadly so,” said Agon. “I have been trying to get some hard evidence for weeks now but the man covers his tracks well.”

“What about this place?” said Gavin and looked around, for the first time being able to take in the full sight of the hundreds of androids stored here. “If we can link these things to Grayson we might have something substantial. We know for a fact that these androids have been used to distribute stims all over the city.”

But Agon shook his head. “He’s too smart for that. I’ve already checked. The warehouse belongs to a dummy corporation with no links whatsoever to the Grayson Institute. The androids themselves are empty shells. There is no software inside. In fact they don’t even have an AI.”

“Great, another dead end then.”

“What else do you have on Grayson?” asked Mech.

Agon gave her a skeptical look. “I don’t particularly trust Federation agencies, why should I share any of our information with you?”

She answered him with a playful smile. “Well how about a little deal then? You tell us what you know and in return we won’t arrest you for firing on Municipal Safety officers.”

He returned her smile in kind. “You wouldn’t be able to detain me for very long. I have protected diplomatic status. My embassy would make sure I’d be released in no time.”

"You’re clearly not familiar with our horribly complicated bureaucracy then,” said Gavin. “A petition by your embassy would take weeks to be processed. We can drag it out to months if necessary. A long time for you to get an intimate familiarity with our penal system."

Agon nodded slowly. “Fine,” he said. “We’re after the same thing after all. We don’t have much however.” He retrieved a data port and attached it to the side of his neck. Within moments he had copied all the information he was willing to share.

Mech did the same with a data port of her own.

They exchanged devices and the LT attached his port to her own neck. She checked if it had any aggressive firewalls designed to attempt and fry her brain first and only once she was satisfied he wasn’t playing dirty she checked the data.

“Grayson owns a compound out of town, not officially of course, near Half Moon Bay. I know for a fact he’s working on something big there but I haven’t been able to get close. Security is very tight, but you strike me as somebody who might not be deterred by such obstacles.”

Gavin returned Agon’s phaser and he quickly holstered it. “You’ll have to excuse me now, my employers will want to get my report. But who knows? Our paths might cross again,” he said and gave Mech another glance. “It was a pleasure,” he said and walked away.

The young operative watched him leave. “Do you trust him?”
“Not for a minute."

“What do we do now?”

She offered him a seemingly innocent smile.

Gavin knew Mech well enough by now to know that there was nothing innocent about it. “I don’t like when you do that.”


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